Drug WarRant

Via Hit and Run comes this disturbing article by Ted Galen Carpenter at the Cato Institute.
He starts by talking about recent drug war censorship developments in the U.S. (such as Istook’s folly), and then moves to a more global perspective.

The most ominous proposal for repressing pro-drug reform speech comes (not surprisingly) from the United Nations. The UN’s International Narcotics Control Board has issued a report implicitly calling on member states to criminalize opposition to the war on drugs. Citing the 1988 UN Convention Against Illicit Trafficking in Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances, the INCB asserts that all governments are obligated to enact laws that prohibit “inciting” or “inducing” people to use illegal drugs and to punish such violations as criminal offenses.
If such a vague and chilling restriction on freedom of expression were not odious enough, the UN board contends that any portrayal that shows illicit drug use “in a favourable light” constitutes incitement and therefore should be banned as well. Since the report also repeatedly denounces medical marijuana initiatives as well as decriminalization or legalization proposals, even the most sedate advocacy of changing prohibitionist drug laws might run afoul of the censorship regime being pushed by the United Nations.

[Aside:] Here’s the actual referenced text from the 1988 UN Convention:

Article 3.1) Each Party shall adopt such measures as may be necessary to establish as criminal offences under its domestic law, when committed intentionally:….
c) Subject to its constitutional principles and the basic concepts of its legal system:…
iii) Publicly inciting or inducing others, by any means, to commit any of the offences established in accordance with this article or to use narcotic drugs or psychotropic substances illicitly;
iv) Participation in, association or conspiracy to commit, attempts to commit and aiding, abetting, facilitating and counselling the commission of any of the offences established in accordance with this article.

Back to the Cato article:

It is not reassuring that the U.S. government has pledged to cooperate with the UN group’s global anti-drug efforts. Although Washington has not explicitly endorsed the censorship recommendations, neither has it stated that the United States rejects such proposals — even though it certainly could have added that caveat. Indeed, one official pledged “absolute cooperation” with the UN’s drug control programs.

This brings up something that I haven’t talked about too much at Drug WarRant: As we work to reform the drug laws in our countries, we must also work to do so internationally. If George Bush today directed the DEA to remove marijuana from the schedule of controlled substances and make its use legal (don’t hold your breath), we would immediately run afoul of international treaties. It is, in fact, international pressure that has created the bizarre situation in the Netherlands, where it is “legal” to use marijuana, but still illegal to sell it.
The UN Office on Drugs and Crime and the International Narcotics Control Board (an “independent, quasi-judicial control organ for the implementation of the United Nations drug conventions” – whatever that means) have been extremely gung-ho on the side of the drug warrriors – their membership has been controlled by appointments from high profile drug warrior countries.
It’s likely that it will take partial reform in a lot of countries to start to influence international treaties, but it’s also important to work toward reform in a number of different ways. Here’s something you can do right now, in just a few seconds: Sign the international appeal for an Anti-prohibitionist Reform of Drug Laws.

Do it now. Whatever your views are of the United Nations in other areas, this particular area is one that is clearly in need of serious reform. Unfortunately, it’s the one area that our government is enthusiasticlaly supporting, which speaks ill for our future.
Carpenter closes with:

Such examples suggest that some advocates of drug prohibition regard the “war” on drugs as more than a metaphor. Pervasive intolerance is also all too typical of a wartime mindset in which opponents are seen, not merely as people who hold a different point of view, but as traitors to a noble cause.
Regardless of one’s position on drug legalization, Americans who believe in freedom of expression and in the importance of political debate ought to condemn Istook’s measure and all other attempts to stifle the pro-legalization case. Otherwise, the First Amendment might become the most prominent example of “collateral damage” in the war on drugs.

I talked a while back about the notion of being “smart” on crime (rather than “tough” on crime), and hoped that more politicians would pursue that notion.
Well here’s another one. Via SFGate:

Kamala Harris was sworn in Thursday as the first black woman in California history to serve as a district attorney, pledging to be “smart on crime” as she assumes the role of San Francisco’s top prosecutor.
She said she would not compromise on her resolve “to protect our loved ones who need medical marijuana. Those who need medical marijuana, I want you to know that I will defend your rights and vigorously oppose any encroachment on them by outside agencies.”
But Harris had words for the city’s violent criminals, saying they will “be met with the most severe consequences.”

Now that’s an approach to crime that I can support.

Check out a wonderful OpEd by Martin Haines, a retired Superior Court judge and a former State Bar Association president, published Thursday in the Asbury Park Press.
Some important stats, plus these comments:

The evidence is crystal clear: The drug war is a destructive failure. Every statistic underlines the fact that drug use over time has increased regularly despite the ever-widening war and its ever-increasing cost…

Yet our governments persist in escalating the war, unwilling to accept its failure. They have convinced the public, through years of misleading education, that drug use is so threatening to our society that harsh criminal laws, tough prosecutions and stiff penalties offer the only hope of keeping it in check. As a result, elected officials, fearful of looking soft on drugs and losing elections, refuse to consider alternatives.

In fact, only alternatives to the drug war can resolve our drug problems. Harsh laws, as the statistics show, make the problem worse, not better. Those laws must be changed. Treatment should become the first and best alternative to punishment. Penalties must be reduced to recognize marijuana as mostly harmless unless used in large quantities. Judges need sentencing discretion that permits them to deal with defendants constructively and individually, instead of subjecting them to the same punishment for the same offense, regardless of age, history and the nature and extent of drug use. Without that discretion, sentences depend entirely on the offense charged by prosecutors, who enjoy largely unreviewable control over charging decisions. Foreign countries are moving to adopt such changes. Holland, for example, has adopted law reforms that permit up to 30 grams of marijuana to be possessed and cultivated without risking arrest or prosecution. It has encouraged the growth of clubs, where marijuana can be purchased openly and safely….

Badly needed is an ongoing public discussion of the drug war and its alternatives. Public officials have resisted such discussions. Without them there can be little hope of convincing a badly educated public that the drug war is wrong, harmful, expensive and incorrect in its premises. The public needs to be redirected to that understanding. When it is, decent laws can be adopted to end the drug war.